went home & swallowed the sunrise,
coughed a little as it went down,
but we’ve never had much of a choice
in the grief that finds us. i look
at scientific reconstructions of
neanderthal faces and want to be
friends with the red-cheeked woman
and her eyes like a sleek seal’s. i wasn’t
meant to be so far apart from love, winter
light choking the windowsill to silence.
in a hundred years, this bed will be
underwater. a tangle of decaying blankets
like cream-colored ghosts. a nest for the
one-in-two-million blue lobster, sold for
$60 a pound today, waiting for a home
on this drowned coast of the future.
did you know that old lobsters lead
the young by their claws to remembered
resting grounds? did you know that orcas
will float on their sides to watch
the northern lights? i think they understand
many things i don’t.
in a thousand years, who will piece
my face back together? can i ask them
to get me wrong in a way that will make me
understandable? selfish, to ask history
to bend for me. but no story is true
once it’s told. the lobsters are still
marching their way across the sea,
claw in claw. they can live for a century,
you know. i’ve got a home waiting
for one.
a.s.w. || @avolitorial
